Sunday, September 7, 2008

The company Mike works for had their annual steak roast yesterday and, as usual, the wives were instructed to bring an appetizer. I'm not fond of making appetizers - they always seems like a waste. All that work and you usually end up with a runny mess of leftover dip, a tray of flaccid vegetables, and a platter of cold soggy sauerkraut balls that you have to throw in the trash at the end of the night - or the next morning, depending on how much you drank.

But having been given the task of presenting something delicious to Mike's boss(!) and the other wives(!), I started to get anxious. I deliberated between brie en croute and Vietnamese summer rolls. Delicious, sure - but too fancy, too complicated. So just as I was about to throw up my hands in defeat and resort to cocktail weenies, Mike made a suggestion...

Pig Candy

The ingredients couldn't be simpler - bacon, brown sugar, some ginger powder and maybe a little cayenne for heat.

Cut the bacon in half, coat both sides of each slice in the sugar mixture and put the slices on a broiler pan. Add a little more of the sugar on top and bake at 350°F for 18-20 minutes. Cool on a rack over some newspaper or paper towels.

(Be very careful when you take the bacon out of the oven. The mixture of hot grease and melted sugar would be very painful indeed.)

Sticky, sweet, spicy, crunchy, chewy, salty, smoky...perfection.

The pig candy was a hit and confirmed my theory that, unless you're going to a mosque or a bar mitzvah, you can't ever go wrong with bacon. I was repeatedly asked for the recipe and mine was the only appetizer plate on the buffet* that was empty. Always make more than you think you'll need.

*A chocolate fountain was also on the buffet. And yes, chocolate covered pig candy is as decadent and as scrumptious as it sounds.

22 comments:

I read the title "Pig Candy" and raised a slight eyebrow, asI was not totally grossed out, after all I like pigs and I like candy. And then I read the recipe and suddenly it all clicked and both of my eyebrows raised...in delight. This is a recipe I will try.

Dateline - 13 sept - jeezy creezy - I shoulda read the comments here when preparing my pig candy tonight. Then again, NOT! I put about, oh, 2 teaspoons (at least) of cayenne, considerably less ginger, and we were off to the races. Holy crap, Breda: you are the ruin of me. I'm so besotted with pig candy, and am planning wicked variations. Particularly dangerous when paired with an entire bottle of champagne. No, I didn't eat the whole pound of bacon, (I did kill the champers, tho, I admit) but I did nearly eat half the pack. ZOMG. This is me gone wild, Saturday night. Now I'm on YouTube watching mexican exploitation nun come-hither films from the 70s with no subtitles and I don't speak spanish. I blame you.

I would like to thank the writer of this weblog for introducing me to pig candy (through the Aegis of LawDog).

I did not have any ginger powder around, but I found that the indian spice mixture, garam masala, worked quite well, at a mixture of one teaspoon spice to one cup brown sugar. I call the result, "Hindu Pig Candy".

I will of course be looking at suitable Arab spice mixes, with an eye towards Moroccan and Egyptian mixes. I will let you know what I find, as I am looking forward soon to providing the world with "Halal Pig Candy". You know, kind of the Islamic equivalent of Kosher Bacon.

And now, having done my best to be double-plus-un-PC with more than half the cultures of the world, I shall take my leave. Or duck for cover.